Some more poems

Here are some poems I have written recently.

The first is one I wrote after going to a Mary and Martha service (Anglican Women's Fellowship service) and getting lost on the way.

IT'S NOT A PROBLEM. JUST FOLLOW THE BUS

There’s a red and white bus to take us to our meeting.

(We all simply must be there,)

but I can’t stay for tea; I have to leave early, 

so I drive  in my car, my own little car,

my little blue car

just behind it.

The sun shines bright, the gulls fly free.

The bus trundles on, on the road by the sea.

I sing as I drive in my own little car,

my little blue car,

just behind it.

The bus-driver swerves out to pass a slow truck.

 There are cars in the way and I have to swerve back

The bus speeds on, on the road by the sea

and I am there in my own little car

my little blue car

far behind it.

The bus turns left and then turns right

I see it stop by a traffic light,

but when I get there the bus is gone.

Do I turn left, or right, or go straight on

in my own little car, my little blue car,

in order to follow behind it?

The chairlady sitting in the back of the bus

gets worried when she looks 
through the window of the bus

and she doesn’t see me, in my own little car

my little blue car

just behind her.

I get a message on my hands-free phone

With directions to get to the meeting

then the phone goes dead. There’s no coverage.

The bus has gone without trace and I’m quite lost

in my own little car, my little blue car

far behind it.

But somehow I reach the town of Belhar

and there I meet a charming man called Basil (of Belhar,)

who takes me to all the churches in Belhar

until we find the red and white bus

and I park my own car, my little blue car

right behind it

  

DIPSTICK

She was the first dog that was my very own,

wouldn’t walk with anyone 

unless I told her to. She owned

one black ear and one white

and on her head a spot

to indicate the place to drop a kiss.

The face she showed the world

was pure and innocent, but underneath

there lurked the nature of a thief,

a devious raider of cupboards with a love

for trash and rubbish bins.

She was a hunter, dedicated to

the hounding of squirrels, geese and ducks. 

a killer of rats and moles, a TV star,

a guardian of the home, and

for all her sixteen years,

my friend.

GHOSTS

“He sees a ghost,” you say

When your dog stares, growling, at an empty wall.

But do dogs see ghosts?

No, they don’t. They smell them.

There is a mouse-shaped smell that haunts

the space beneath the kitchen cupboard,

just in the spot a hapless rodent met its fate,

head bitten off and swallowed.

Say”mouse”− Jack Russell, Beemer

jumps up and barks and runs straight there.

There is a smelly feline ghost

that lives in the back lane and even I

catch whiffs of it at times. And then

there is the postman ghost

that hovers by my grandson’s gate

Dogs always circle him

with hackles raised.

though no one sends us letters any more.

And when my little dog sniffs round and round

a worn patch on the mat, and curls up

next to it, I know he smells the ghost

of my old beagle, Dipstick

lying there.